Letter of the week: A certain idea of Britain

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Paul Ovenden’s outstanding essay (The NS Essay, 30 January) coincides with increasing interest as to how Britain and France faced up in their different ways to the challenge of postwar renewal in 1945. De Gaulle’s stark choice for the French people between “the sweet shadow of decline, and the harsh light of renewal” has to be seen against his convictions about his native land from his earliest days. An ageing Churchill was no match for a reinvigorated De Gaulle. His conviction that France must never again have to depend on the US for its defence today looks like extraordinary prescience. Similarly, his belief that France’s renewal and peace on its borders could only come about through a lasting alliance with Germany has stood the test of time. Starmer is no De Gaulle, to put it mildly. But the challenge Starmer faces can only be met by a kind of Gaullist hauteur… Or, as Ovenden describes it, “driven by the values and the traits [Starmer] sees as Britain’s – decency, respect, fairness, with a healthy dose of pride and stubbornness”. He has a steep hill to climb, and time is short.
Dennis Richards, Harrogate, North Yorkshire

The widening gyre

Paul Ovenden (The NS Essay, 30 January) argued that should Labour articulate a “national direction and purpose”, the public would accept “expensive decisions” and “painful trade-offs”. But he misreads the electorate. There is no doubt that the values and traits cited earlier in the piece – decency, respect, fairness, pride – exist. But those values have been steadily diminishing in the wake of the onslaught of the past 40 years of regulation-lite neo-liberalism. Instead, there has been a rise of less wholesome traits: significant sections of the public now exhibit a more “entitled” outlook, which has also seen a passionate counter-reaction. The end result is an electorate that is fragmented and with large numbers holding more extreme positions. There isn’t enough of an electoral constituency remaining in the centre to accept such a proposition as Ovenden envisages. That landscape isn’t going to change soon, yet we find ourselves with an electoral system that is ill-equipped for this new reality. Surely moving on from the first-past-the-post system is the next step to putting us on a path to working together better in seeking the common good?
Michael Haskell, Broughton, Wales

Webb of lies

Will Dunn writes about conspiracy theories concerning the Fabian Society (The Sketch, 30 January). Has he forgotten that the Fabians and the New Statesman have a shared heritage? This magazine was founded by early Fabian Society members Sidney and Beatrice Webb. On the question of what the society is, for me it’s a source of debate – rather like this magazine. Now, probably more than ever, the left needs new ideas, which is why we need the Fabians.
Peter Halsey, Radlett, Herts

The Boy Who Lived Nearby

I very much enjoyed Finn McRedmond’s caustic piece on Harry Potter World (This England, 30 January). I grew up within a mile of the site, and it is perhaps worth reflecting on how it has changed. First it was a farm, then a plant in which were built Halifax and Mosquito aeroplanes to defeat the Nazis. Then a factory making engines for light aircraft and helicopters, in which many of my friends worked. It was empty for a while, before it became a film studio. And now it is a theme park. For good or ill, that is a pretty good analogy for the story of our nation over the past 80 years.
Adam Penwarden, Brighton

Finn McRedmond decries the world of Harry Potter for its “Latinate spells”. I like to think that JK Rowling might have been inspired in creating some of those by her time at Exeter University, studying French and classics: my late father was one of her lecturers in the latter. She wrote in the 1998 departmental magazine Pegasus that the character of Professor Binns, an authority on magical law, was based on one of her teachers – widely thought by his colleagues to have been my dad.
Tom Stubbs, Surbiton, Surrey

A comedy of errors

I liked Jonathan French’s story of the gravestone inscription, revised from “Lord, she in thine” to “e’ Lord, she is thin” (Correspondence, 30 January). Another misprint, if I may: when I produced a BBC series called India: A Cacophony of Cultures, the publicity department put out a press release with the header India: A Cacophony of Vultures. OK, it wasn’t on my gravestone, but I sometimes feel as if it had a sort of predictive force on my subsequent career.
David Perry, Cambridge

Jonathan French of York tells a good joke – the old ones are the best. He’s surely mistaken, though, in claiming that it comes from Yorkshire. If ever there was a Lancashire joke, then this is it. My father, from Bamber Bridge as he was, is doubtless turning in his grave that the good folk of Lancashire have been deceived into the election of a Reform council. Jonathan French has only added to his discomfort.
Bill McMellon, Chichester, West Sussex

During my time as a cub reporter on the Carmarthen Journal, way back in the era of hot-lead printing, misprints were common. In those days wedding reports ran to a full column. A most notorious error related to a best man presenting the bride with a “travelling clock” – or so it should have read. The missing letter outraged both families, but caused great hilarity throughout the county.
Alun Lenny, Carmarthen, Wales

What a Pahlavi

Noor Pahlavi (Another Voice, 30 January) seems to have a complete lack of awareness that her grandfather was not particularly well loved, and there are many today who reject the idea that her father, “Prince” Reza Pahlavi, is a suitable candidate to be leading the “opposition in exile” or involved in the planning of how a future Iran might look. I look forward to reading some alternative points of view of how, if Iran freed from the current regime, might look and be created.
Mark Schofield, Wootton, Bedfordshire

I guess we all hope for a democratic, secular, peaceful and prosperous future for Iran. I’m less convinced by the attractions of a role for the Pahlavi family in this future. Iranians remember Noor Pahlavi’s grandfather, the former shah who introduced women’s rights, reforms to land tenure and education. He also headed the bureau for intelligence and security of the state (Savak), one of the most brutal security services in the Middle East. Acknowledging the horrors of Savak and the role played by the Pahlavi family would be a prerequisite for their return to Iran.
Simon Ransome, Kelsale, Suffolk

Claudia comes first

I’ve been reading the New Statesman for nearly two decades and I like to think it is indicative of my progressive approach to life. But I think a better indication of what matters in my world is the fact that, in the recent issue, I rushed past more serious matters to avidly read “Why women like Claudia Winkleman” (Out of the Ordinary, 23 January).
Sarah Juggins, King’s Lynn, Norfolk

Illegitimi non carborundum

In your otherwise excellent magazine, nothing annoys me more than the use of italicised words and phrases in French or Latin, without explanation. Can we have the King’s English please? As my old mum used to say, “Stop it boys [it’s rarely the girls] – it’s not big and it’s not clever!
Brian Cunningham, Norwich

Think before you ink

I would be interested to hear from other New Statesman readers if they would like to join a new readers group to protest against the use of dark colours on the back cover. Much of the ink rubs off, and I am willing to bet that every week thousands of gallons of water are wasted on our collective washing of hands, with an obvious cost to the environment, if not of society as such. The new readers group may be called “Stop washing your hands of the New Statesman”.
Colin Challen, Scarborough

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[Further reading: The Epstein files expose the rot of Mandelson’s Britain]